Gordon and Jennifer + Thursday ruins Disgaea's story?

[Vacanza]

Hello
I'm the only one who thinks that these 3 characters kinda ruins Disgaea's story?
They come into play right after the Red Moon chapter, where the game's story takes a very serious turn, and they lead the story back into some absurd cliché - parody novel.

Now it's not their story itself that kinda ruins the whole plot, is the fact that THE ENTIRE story from Chapter 9 seems to evolve around Gordon and Jennifer, and Laharl gets like a secondary role...it's absurd and dull.

I love the first chapters of the story, I think Laharl is a great anti-hero like character which kinda gets trashed as story progressed by Flonne and her love-freak-nonsense, which in the end turns Laharl into a way less appealing "nice good guy" which is really revolting considering just how well Laharl's personality works in the first chapters, I think Laharl was pretty much perfect: pesky, arrogant, childish, evil-wannabe-but-not-too-serious, he was the kind of "evil guy" which looks and act evil but he is not that bad of a person inside, he is evil and childish, but never cruel, that was my Laharl.

Anyway leaving Flonne and her love-poisoning influence over Laharl, Godon's trio is way worse than that, completely deflecting the story of the Demon Overlord Laharl to a low budget sci-fi movie with spaceships...ugh, lame.

Last chapters in Celestia are also pretty uninspired, mostly because Laharl's character is pretty ruined at that point so there isn't really the "Evil guy doing good stuff" feeling in it, and also because the villain was pretty obvious all along.

Oh, by the way, no complains about Etna, heck, she gets way more backstory than Laharl, but overall, pretty good character, love her personality.

I wish Disgaea was a more role-playing like game,where player can constantly make choices about what to do and what NOT to do, and depending on player choices he gets different ending at the last chapter...that would be way better.

[The Knight of Faerie]

Eh, it'd be pretty hard for chapter 9 to "ruin" the storyline of Disgaea. I mean, the entire thing is rather silly. I'm also not entirely sure why you're so against character growth (as opposed to power growth) being portrayed throughout the game. I mean, sure Laharl acts childish. He IS a child. And over the course of the game he's forced to confront his insecurities, fears, and other issues. Over time he grows up. You find this a bad thing?

How does chapter 9 ruin the story by dragging things back into silly territory? Even chapter 8 celebrates the absurd for the most part, although there are serious undertones throughout the first 7 chapters too. Were you aware that if you're too reckless and end up killing your party members too often, Etna kills Laharl during an early chapter and you get an Ending Sequence?

The story is, overall, about Laharl growing up and becoming a better person. And random weirdness happening left, right, and center. Captain Gorden fits right in. I mean, you do realize that there's a Power Rangers parody sentai group later in the game, right? And that there's quests such as "recover the Ultimate Zombie", where part of the zombie's build is specifically stated to be a horse weiner.

[Vacanza]

Off course it's a bad thing if is written bad.

The whole Laharl "conversion" or "growing up" as you said was lame at best, and in the end it looks pretty forced and unnatural on Laharl.
Laharl's character is way more convincing (and appealing) at the start of Disgaea, and I'm well aware of all those things you pointed out, but again, the story was way better before the Gordon trio showed up, they take way too much the spotlight and we players are thrown into their drama in the late game like we should give a damn about them.
And worse of all, the "humor" and the "absurdities" in the story after Gordon trio is rather way too cheap, too direct, not sure how I can explain this, it just feels like some B-movie trying too hard, it simply doesn't blend with the rest of the story.

Also if you seen Laharl's appearances in the other Disgaea games you do realize that he act nothing like Disgaea 1's "endgame story" but way more like he was at start of it, you know why? because as I already said, he is simply a way better / interesting character the way he was than what he becomes later in the story, even the developers realized that.

[The Ranch King]

First about Laharal and Flonne: I always saw their stories in Disgaea as both of them overcoming their own flawed perceptions. Laharal has to overcome his perceptions on love, demonhood and leadership primarily in the first half of the game (Things like a good leader accepts what's best for his subordinates, being a demon is different from being a monster, that love is not this horrible weakness), while Flonne has to confront the fact that her own idea of love was incredibly naive (Having to face the fact that it can't magically solve the tragic situation of PrinnyMom, that kindness and affection aren't always the correct answers).

Whether these stories of development were handled well or not, is up to the viewer though. I do know I could never have been able to stand Laharal's character if not for Etna's sacrificing most of her own development to be Laharal's foil. Disgaea 3's Mao is proof of that for me.

There are more endings though? On the last chapter, there are two endings that I can remember: if you never accidentally or intentionally killed an ally, Laharal goes full "She would want me to spare you", but if you have, Laharal does kill Lamington and Flonne remains a flower.

As for the Defenders of Earth trio...I feel like they were primarily there as a "breather episode" between two more emotional arcs, as well as give to Laharal a chance to connect together his "I-am-a-maturing-leader" with his "I-am-a-petty-not!teenager" personality on an acceptable target.

[The Knight of Faerie]

I don't think anyone is going to claim that the story for Disgaea games are high art or a masterpiece of drama and character growth. What they are however, is a rather silly tale that occasionally has serious undertones while poking fun at it's own tropes. Chapter 9, and from what I understand it the Sentai group later on do just that. They poke fun at all the standard tropes of those genres. In the case of chapter 9 it's poking fun at the tropes of the science fiction B movies and serials, as well as shows like Lost in Space.

It's not intended to be taken seriously. They expect you to laugh at the silly antics and hillariously stereotyped characters. Captain Gorden is very much a stereotypical 1950's science fiction hero. The girl is the stereotypical 1950's Bimbo Girl who associates with said hero. And the robot is poking fun at things like the robot from Lost in Space. And they're not being played strait. They are being lampooned and exagerated to show just how silly those stereotypes were.